QUARTERLY
MIKE MARTIN JR HONORS PAST, LOOKS TO FUTURE By JIM CROSBY
SEMINOLE-BOOSTERS.COM
UNCONQUERED MAGAZINE
SPRING 2020
51
PHOTOS COURTESY FSU SPORTS INFORMATION
Editor’s note: This story was originally planned as a 2020 preview but has been revised to reflect how the Seminoles performed before the season was halted.
When the keys to the head baseball coach’s office at Florida State University were handed over to Mike Martin Jr., he accepted a responsibility that no other college coach in the country had ever assumed. Mike Jr., or Meat as everyone calls him, was taking the reins from the coach who had won more games than any other coach in the history of college sports. Mike Martin Sr. stepped down after the 2019 season (his 40th) having won 2,029 games. “A bunch of my buddies have said I’m crazy to go into a situation like this because it’s never going to be enough. The expectations are set,” Martin Jr. said while sitting behind the desk that was formerly occupied by his dad. Glancing out the window, in plain view on the huge video board with the words: Mike Martin Field. The enormity of the task was one that Martin Jr. embraced from the start. And he was prepared with 22 years of on-the-jobtraining as an assistant coach. It was a role that included recruiting coordinator, hitting instructor and third base coach. As a former Seminole catcher, he also shared his knowledge with the catchers. And don’t count on his team looking like a carbon copy of the ones before him, even though they were led by his dad, the man who had instilled a wealth of baseball knowledge in his life. A man who should know about that is FSU baseball’s Director of Operations, Chip Baker, who begins his 37th year with Seminole Baseball. Baker, called the Big Shooter by everyone, watched Meat grow up and used to bang tennis balls around in the backyard with him as a kid. Asked if it will be different around the friendly confines now, without hesitating he answered: “Yes, it will be a lot different. Mike Martin Jr. is his own man. Always has been. Fatherson camaraderie can sometimes be father-son banging heads a little bit.” Asked what he will do differently Meat had an immediate answer: “I really want to tackle the mental health side. I think there is a lot more to it than some coaches realize and put stock in. We want to have mandatory mental conditioning as far as being able to clear your mind when you are out on the field,” he said. At his opening press conference, he elaborated: “We want them right mentally, physically, spiritually and socially.”
